Microbiology| Passion in a Petri Dish

As much as I wish I could say I have always loved microbiology, I really stumbled upon the subject by accident. The only reason I took my first microbiology course was because it was a prerequisite for the nursing program, and nursing is the career I had initially thought I wanted. In fact, I had actually been warned against microbiology by apparently older and wiser students because it was one of the hardest prerequisites to succeed in. It was full of independent study, the concepts were hard to remember, the exam questions were tough, you had to know everything. They told me if I pushed it to the last possible quarter then my nursing application would be submitted before I had a grade and all I would have to do was pass.

My experience with microbiology could not have been more distinctly different. Not only was I captivated by the material presented, I hungered for the challenge. As my success became apparent, I realized that there was something very different about microbiology than other difficult courses I had taken. Believe me, I studied my tail off for that first class, but two things about my experience with microbiology struck me in particular. The first was that the material made so much sense, it really clicked for me. I think this finding was also related to the fact that I found microbes so dang interesting. Even as single cells with far less DNA to work with than you and I, they have been able to solve some fabulously difficult biological problems with elegance. The second thing I noticed was that I had less trouble memorizing and retaining things than I did in some of my other courses, such as chemistry. Studying didn't feel like work, and I seemed to remember the material after seeing it just once or twice. Even my instructor had noticed my success, and contacted me outside of class, curious about what I was studying and what my goals were. She invited me to take an upper division class she was teaching the next fall: medical bacteriology lab. Once I tasted this particular chemoattractant, I was hooked, and began to follow the trail with ferocity.